Bonding With SpiritsNote: This is based off my experiences, may not apply to you, your mileage may vary.

Like with relations with humans and animals, boundaries are needed. I suggest that a list of "soft" boundaries that can be pushed and tested and a list of hard boundaries that will never be crossed. (i.e illegal things like rape and murder.)

I list spirits into three sections, depending on how complicated they are. Complex, Peer, and Simple. Complex spirits are roughly around what humans call gods, angels, etc. Basically, anything more complicated then a human on a mental level. My notes on how those spirits work is here. Peer is a spirit roughly on the same mental level as you, certain types of fae, elementals, younger demons, etc are roughly on the same levels as humans. Simple spirits are those who are self-aware but extremely simple minded, inaimate objects and elementals, astral parasites, etc are categorized here.

I have the most experience with this level of spirit considering Malphas is pretty fucking complex and a shard of him lives with me and we're extremely intimate with each other. Living and bonding with a complex-level spirit meant undoing a lot of my preconceptions of what a "god" is. I was raised Catholic so I grew up thinking that a "god "would be omnipresent and be able to protect me from everything if I wasn't going to be smited. Even though I rejected my Catholic upbringing, a lot of the preconceptions from there still affected me subconsciously.

Later on, while I was in high school, I read blogs with very devout godslaves and spiritworkers and I walked away with a very skewed idea of what a healthy spirit/human relationship looked like, I was under the impression that one had to be devouted and formal 24/7 otherwise I would end up offending the spirit and risk punishment. So that was something else I had to unprogram myself from. A) Shit I Had To Unlearn: Thinking That Deity-Level Spirits Can Protect You From Everything

One of the hardest things that I had to learn while being married to Malphas was...they can't fucking protect one from everything. I used to fully rely on Malphas to protect me, with no wards of my own. Hahahah, bad fucking idea. Malphas is a powerful spirit, his raw power is tasty and he commands legions upon legions. But he's also spread thin and so things slip beneath his notice, and the problem with relying on a powerful spirit....you also become a target for other spirits that are easily as powerful and the threat level rises and they can easily breach your wards if constant vigilance isn't kept up.

So ward breaches happened and I got HELLA angry at Malphas for this shit happening and I would bitch him out for it. I was still assuming that powerful spirits were infallible and perfect and bla bla bla. Eventually, the both of us wised up and he took my security more seriously and started tutoring me in ward crafting. Its pretty damn empowering to work on my own wards and doing my own wards, frees up Malphas' energy to focus on bigger threats that I can't handle on my own and he can also help me keep mantained/do the subtle energy crafting that my crappy human energy senses can't handle yet.

Also, powerful spirits can be arrogant as fuck. I know one that had crappy ass wards that defended his human and I had to bitch him out about it. The spirit's sense of ego was so inflated, that it made him complacent enough to think that weaker spirits were too scared to attack his human and that his wards were better then they really are. So if one relies on spirit-created wards, make sure the spirit's ego isn't a fucking security risk.

Malphas also told me an interesting point on why spirits/gods can't prevent all tthe shit that happens to humanity. One) The pantheons have various laws dictating on how much they can intervene, two) There's too many humans to keep track off, three) They have their own lives to worry about, and four) Necessity is the mother of invention, if spirits intervened too much, humanity would stop progressing on things like science and rely on the deity-level spirits to solve everything.

I'm still embarrassed by my memories of being overdependent on the spirits and being a brat about it. -____________-

B) Shit I Had To Unlearn 2: The Pedestal.

One thing I used to be really insecure with...was my casual treatment of Malphas. I'm not very formal with him, as long he's not freaking out my family and roommates, I didn't give a fuck if the spirits showed up in my house daily. But I did tell them that they had to put up with my everyday normal self.

Burping, Farting, Going to the bathroom....reading manga, looking at porn...yeah. From all of those spiritworker and devotional polytheist blogs...I thought I had to be more high "church"and formal, and I felt bad that I didn't have the energy to do that stuff everyday. I felt bad for being a regular person outside of spirit shit. -.- After a year and a half of the spirits watching me derp around, I realized I wasn't being punished and that they didn't care, so I started to be less insecure about it.But I still take the time to sit my ass down and communicate with them, learn from them. So I guess that's the most important part. Learning with them, spending time with them as a family...yes, family. I have a familial relationship with them and one of the biggest reasons I never did formal worship is because worshipping your mom is fucking weird, since Malphas and I also have a parent/child relationship.

I would like there to be more recognition of different ways to interact with deity-level spirits, outside of just formal worship. C) Shit I Had To Unlearn 3: They Don't Know Everything

One of the things that carried over from my Catholic upbringing was that God knew everything. And its stated in the Goetia that Malphas is capable of mind-reading. Cue me thinking that I don't have to communicate anything to Malphas at all. ....Once I didn't tell him that my roommates were having a party that weekend because I thought he already knew from my thoughts. He didn't. The young demons that live with us got drunk on the all the alcohol. He got hella furious, it was still funny though.

Turns out that Malphas didn't always read my mind because a) most of it is boring human drivel to him and b) to give me privacy. Only thing that he really keeps tabs on are things like my emotions, stress drive, and certain key words in my brain...like "suicide." It's only when I'm distressed, horny, or call for him, that he scans my mental/physiological signs more closely. He also does that when he's lonely and wants attention.

Shit I Had To Unlearn 4: They Are Not Unfeeling

Yes, lonely and wants attention. Much to my surprise, when I first learned of this...demons like Lucifer and Malphas have psychological problems from the Fall, since it was traumatizing to be split from God, their Creator. I always thought of powerful spirits to be proud stoic beings that never showed their vulnerability. And that it was impossible for them to be vulnerable.

This is a jackass move of mine that I did when I was eighteen, I wouldn't do this now and have changed for the better, it still guilts me to this day. I remember Malphas telling me of how he was raped by another similarly-ranking spirit...I laughed. I laughed because the thought of a powerful demon king being raped was hilarious to me at the time. I didn't even know it was possible for goetic demons to be raped. Didn't think that deity-level spirits could even be hurt.

And it's not funny to me any more. After that incident, that shardof Malphas emotionally withdrew from me for months. And since I interact with so many shards, I don't even know if it's still emotionally withdrawn from me. I still remember apologizing to that shard many months later and my horror when I realized what I did was extremely shitty of me to do. It took me a long time to learn how to treat demons as nonphysical people with feelings and not just the stereotype that they are faceless monstrosities that are unfeeling.

My Techniques For Bonding With Complex-Level Spirits: Cities

I call myself an "urban" mage, and that includes being connected to the local city spirit. For me, it connects to my heart chakra and I envision a root from the city spirit reaching from the ground, into that energy point of mine. It's very natural for me to have my "sphere"of awareness" touch the city spirit, since I'm a part of it, I live in it.

City spirits are the sum of their parts, the people, the cultures, the spirits, the buildings, the land, the urban habitats, the animals, etc.

From what I experienced, the City spirits have a close relationship with the Archetype of Money and Humanity, since those are the two things that drive it. Paying rent, spending money and having a job keeps the lifeblood of the city going. Same with paying for transit, don't piss off the transit spirits, for a while, I was loosing shit and having trouble finding housing and I think it was because the City thought if I couldn't be trusted to pay the full bus fare, it couldn't trust me to pay the rent. A healthy economy is a healthy city spirit.

Other ways to bond with City spirits is to get to know the community. Read the local papers and bulletin boards, get involved in the arts community, volunteer to make it a better place, befriend people, feel your connection with the city and community, read the history of the city, attend festivals, etc.

Take walks, go on a drive, communicate with the local vehicle and building spirits and tell them how much you appreciate them. Many enjoy a hand running down the wall/side of the vehicle, the ways are countless.

It doesn't matter what you do, as long you feel connected somehow to something related in the City.

Bonding With Spirits: Peer Level

1) Look past appearances, no matter how scary they look. Spirits often look scary either to feed off the fear or to protect themselves and their young from predators. Also, its usually not their true form, many baby fear eaters are capable of terrifying illusions.

2)Learn about their cultures, a lot of spirits are intelligent enough to have their own societies, hidden away from human eyes, since they aren't human, they look at things differently then we do and it's fascinating and its helpful to understand the local spirit's behavior and customs in order to improve relations.

3) Roommate arrangements with trusted spirits is a good way to learn about them. Set up a list of house rules and let them have free access to the food in the kitchen and free beds/couches to sleep on. Or if you're comfortable enough with them, they might also use you as a bedwarmer. Roommate arrangements can make for some hilarious wtf situations like...Malphas eating goblin shit. 4) Be careful about how your spells affect the local spirit enviroment. The local spirit realms overlapping the human realm are affected by the physical world even human spellcasting affects them, I cover this in more detail here.

Bonding With Simple Level Spirits

However, ever since I learned that inanimate objects can have souls...I anguish over how many inanimate objects with souls out there are buried in a landfill...and over the rough treatment of them by humans who don't know about the soul and most likely don't care.

I know it sounds stupid, but when you have a high spirit empathy like me...you start to see everything as a person and feel guilty when even the smallest creature gets hurt. Like ants.